Kelly McParland: Separatism feels so good when it stops

This is going to be different. Quebec’s fixation on its place in Canada has been like an alarm bell going off in the background for 40 years. What happens when it suddenly stops? Do you start to miss it?

Like most Canadians, I can barely remember a time when Quebec politics wasn’t about separation in one form or another. Voters who cast their first ballot in 1970, when the Parti Quebecois won seven seats and 23% of the vote, are near retirement age now. In every election since then, Canadians have been faced with either the potential of a separatist government claiming power in the second most populist province, or the reality of a PQ government in the “National Assembly” working to find a way out of the country. Even when Quebec voters chose the federalist Liberals to govern the province, English Canada felt the need to placate the province for fear the separatists might mount a comeback, which they invariably did.

Twice the country has endured referendums in which Quebecers were given the option to leave. Pierre Trudeau fought the first by promising concessions to address Quebec’s perceived grievances. Trudeau’s Liberals were followed by Brian Mulroney’s Conservatives, who dragged the country through interminable negotiations in search of an accord that would satisfy its remaining complaints. Back in power in the 1990s, the Liberals almost fumbled away the country by failing to appreciate the level of residual discontent prior to the second referendum, which was defeated by a hair. For two decades, until its collapse in 2011, the separatist Bloc Quebecois held seats in Ottawa, paid for by Canadians with generous salaries and benefits, to bellyache continuously about how badly Francophones were mistreated. Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s first instinct was to cozy up to Premier Jean Charest and offer to fix the “fiscal imbalance,” until he discovered that no ransom was ever enough to buy Quebec’s love.

And now it ends? If you spend 40 years in jail, are you ever really released?

The Bloc has been reduced to a leaderless rump; on Monday the PQ was repudiated in no uncertain terms. It’s possible the party may not survive; certainly the string of angry baby boomers who drove its sense of bitterness and alienation has reached an end with the unlamented departure of Premier Pauline Marois.

Forget identity, fix the potholes.

What happens now is just a guess. For the new majority government of Philippe Couillard, the priority must be on erasing the memories of the most recent Liberal government, which died mired in corruption scandals and ethical breaches. The best thing Couillard could do for his province and country is to focus on righting the badly listing Quebec economy and responding to pragmatic concerns over education, health care and crumbling infrastructure. Forget identity, fix the potholes. He should have considerable time to do so; the PQ will be preoccupied for some time with internal issues, the biggest of which is this: how does a separatist party survive in a province that has made clear it has no more time for talk of separation?

If there is one overarching lesson to be learned from the 2014 Quebec election campaign, it is this: Do not overestimate voters’ appetite for revolutionary change, or their vulnerability to populist demagoguery.

From the fervid expressions of Quebec nationalism that often were emitted from Pauline Marois’ government — and which found a muted echo in the me-too nationalism of the Liberals and Coalition Avenir Québec — one would think that the province were burbling with disaffection. Prime Minister Stephen Harper is unpopular in Quebec and Québécois politicians seem to delight in torquing every national issue into a source of regional umbrage.

Thomas Mulcair may also be scratching his head. The federal NDP has positioned itself as a friend to soft nationalists, promising to let the province leave Canada on the most minimal of conditions. One vote over 50% was good enough for Mr. Mulcair and his troops, who saw such flexibility as a means to holding the 59 seats (now 57) it won in the 2011 election. But now it’s a concession without a demand; separation is out, so Mr. Mulcair’s pliability becomes redundant. Justin Trudeau, his main rival for federal votes, took a firmer line against separatist sentiments and may thus be in a position to reap the benefits. Can Mr. Mulcair afford to be seen encouraging future discontent so he can offer to mollify it? Or does he accept that the ship has sailed and find a new way to challenge Mr. Trudeau?

No Quebec premier in my lifetime has been as unapologetically federalist as Mr. Couillard, while facing so weak a sovereigntist threat. A brainy type who began the campaign by professing to “despise” the whingeing victimhood preached by the PQ, his political skills remain largely untested despite his resounding victory, which was mainly a rejection of the PQ rather than an embrace of the Liberals. His greatest contribution could be to provide competent government free of the navel-gazing language wars and ethnic-bashing that the PQ went in for. A confident people with a strong identity doesn’t need those cheap theatrics. Maybe Quebec can now take the place in Canada it deserves, as one of 10 equal provinces in a strong country. It may find it gets a warmer welcome without the threats.